Good Girls and Golden Gowns
by EstellaB
Summary: In Narnia, Lucy never needed to be wanted. In England, she wondered. Bookverse.


**Summary: Did Lucy ever feel tempted to join in her sister's partying? Post VDT, and very different to anything I've written before. Constructive criticism is more than welcome, but flames will be used to set fire to Susan's suitors.**

**Disclaimer: Er, you clicked his name to get here. CS Lewis owns this. I am only a humble Narniac.**

Susan was getting ready for another night out, Lucy sitting on her sister's bed and offering unenthusiastic opinions on what seemed like thousands of different necklaces. The elder Pevensie had finally grown into her beauty, and she seemed impossibly happy. Ruby-red lipstick and immaculate nylons; if Lucy had been given a farthing each time she had wished for Susan's effortless looks and charm, she would have had half her Narnian fortune back again. Susan stepped away from the mirror and spun for her sister.

"You look lovely, Su." Her sister had gone with the almost-emerald pendant in the end, spinning and catching the light; Lucy's personal favourite, a tiny golden Lion on a plain ribbon, had long since been forgotten. It had been a gift from Peter. Red dress clinging to her sister's small waist and billowing around her ankles; Susan always knew of the latest fashions before they came to English shores. Someone in America was, apparently, a mine of information. When something was not quite popular anymore, it was bequeathed to Lucy. However, the elder Pevensie sister was far taller and more willowy than the younger, and their very different colouring would have kept even Susan's newest gowns from suiting Lucy.

She looked at the red dress and wondered; in Narnia, wars had started over Susan's beauty, blood had been shed by those who wanted her sister as a prize. Nobody would ever start a war over Lucy's beauty, even there, and she would not have wanted it then. In England, she wondered. In England, she had lost all her Narnian elegance; where were her long limbs and slender figure now? She had woken to sparkling eyes and bright cheeks every day there; cooped up, cramped in London, her skin was paper-pale and she was always tired. Susan was too, she knew, but Susan had learnt how to fix the damage with lipstick and a dangerous smile.

"You could come with me," her older sister offered lightly, breaking into her thoughts. As if hoping to sound nonchalant, Susan had not turned from the mirror. "I'd make you up, you could borrow my blue dress, and we'd take their breath away. It would be just like-just like..." Lucy looked at her sister, willing her to say _Narnia _or _the old days _or anything, anything to give some hope that this was all a pretence. Susan faltered, before finishing. "Just like a fairy tale," she concluded firmly. "You're very pretty, you know, Lu. With a little help..."

Lucy observed the faded hem of her little-girl nightgown, already clad for an evening of cocoa and chess with Edmund. She had Jill's letter to reply to, and a good book to read, but she could hear wine glasses clink and see her own self in the mirror, older and self-assured, thousands of years ago, the too-patient nurse stripped away for one evening and instead a beautiful bejewelled young lady, a Valiant Queen; Susan could work that magic.

"Not tonight, thanks," she answered. Once before, she had been offered the chance to be beautiful beyond her sister; she had turned it down then, and when she had seen Aslan, she had been so glad. Susan could not work such magic, and Lucy had not truly welcomed it when possible; Aslan had made her this way and He did not make mistakes. Her tone was almost too cheerful. "Got a lot of letters to catch up with."

Susan shrugged, turning away from the mirror at last. "It's your loss, honey." She smoothed down her skirt. "Don't let Ed come looking for me again, will you?"

"Have a good evening," Lucy replied, hoping Susan's question was rhetorical; she certainly wasn't going to stop Edmund from going out. Her sister left the room, a flurry of expensive perfume and cheap promises. Once she was certain that Susan had gone, she slid off the bed and looked into the mirror herself, trying to will herself to see something else, anything other than the plait over one shoulder and the shapeless clothing. "Once a Queen in Narnia," she whispered, and the picture in the mirror began to look a very little better. "Always a Queen in Narnia."

**Once again, this is new for me, and I'd really appreciate constructive criticism!**

**Also, I am not trying to say that having a night out on the town is a bad thing; I love going out with my friends (though I hate being the one that has to put them all into taxis afterwards because I'm the only one still sober). Sorry if you took offence):**


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